


plausible deniability

by sinistra_blache



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: (unless you keep reading), Arthur is Unaware, Arthur is an army brat, Arthur's trust issues are the real main character, Eames is just a brat, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pre-Canon, Teenage Drama, and external homophobia, so there is an amount of internalized homophobia, this is potentially the fluff before the storm, this is set in the late 90's, you have unlocked: the Good Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:27:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25243888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinistra_blache/pseuds/sinistra_blache
Summary: Arthur hated him. He hated that Eames was right. He hated that his heart thumped in his chest like it was its first time beating when Eames shoved him, hand heavy and warm even through Arthur’s clothes. Arthur hated every second of it.“Shut up,” he hissed viciously through bared teeth.Eames crowed in wordless victory.
Relationships: Arthur/Eames (Inception)
Comments: 19
Kudos: 54





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [insensible](https://archiveofourown.org/users/insensible/gifts).



The most important thing to know about Eames was that he never told the truth. That was Arthur’s assessment and he was sticking to it. He purposefully ignored the possibility that Eames only told the truth, in fact, because he found that idea more upsetting than the idea of him constantly lying. 

It never stopped him from asking questions. It was just nice to hear Eames talk. He would punctuate his stories with long drags of his cigarettes, or pause to shoot Arthur a smile or make sure he was still listening, and whatever ridiculous lie he weaved always sounded so appealing. 

“Siblings?”

“Of course,” Eames answered. 

They were walking out of town and back again. There wasn’t much to do in the little town near where Arthur’s father had found himself stationed. Not everywhere could be Tokyo or Sicily — besides, Arthur didn’t exactly hate it. His only friend was a local liar who was bored 100% of the time, but Arthur enjoyed the quiet. 

“Tell me about them?” 

“I have one brother. My twin brother. I can just imagine what you’re thinking,” Eames smiled widely. He attempted to swipe at Arthur’s legs from where he was walking along the wall by the path, but Arthur hopped out of his reach. “Oh no, Arthur! Another one of me! How dreadful for you, I’m sure.” 

“I can’t imagine anything worse,” Arthur agreed dryly. 

Eames pursed his lips. He was trying not to smile. It wasn’t working. “Mm. Yes, well, he’s not exactly like me. I’m the evil twin,” he continued. Arthur couldn’t help but allow a laugh. If there was a twin, and if there were such things as evil and good twins, then Eames would definitely be the evil one. He was a terrible influence on everyone around him. Arthur included. He was supposed to be studying at home right now instead of wandering aimlessly with a larval-state con-man. 

“He’s polite, for a start. And far too sweet for his own good. Too giving, you understand. Not that he’s overly kind or naive, but just too willing to be generous. If he thought that it would make someone happy, or if it would lead them to like him more, he would give them the shirt off his back. I can’t fathom it. So my poor mother is stuck with all my lovely selfishness while my brother elected to stay with our father.” 

He stopped talking for a moment. Looked down the road to nothing at all. 

“Perhaps he’s the evil twin,” he sighed. 

Those were the moments that made it difficult to remember that Eames was a liar. He always made it seem so real. He would add in details like emotional pain, or longing, or some stupid joke that made you think that it had to be true. Arthur certainly believed that something had damaged Eames in his past. Something had happened to him to make him so keen to make things up, to try to shape his own private world around him. Maybe it was the divorce that he brought up sometimes. Maybe it was something else. 

Even if Eames gave him the reason, Arthur wouldn’t take him at his word. The only thing Arthur believed about Eames was that he was damaged. 

That was, after all, why they got along so well. 

#

“’Scuse me, lads. Do you mind showin’ us the way here?” A man with thick dark hair leaned out of a car window as it pulled up beside where Arthur and Eames were walking. He looked friendly. A woman sat in the passenger seat and gave them a meek smile and a wave while the man rummaged around for a map. Pleasant enough.

Arthur was good at accents. You don’t last very long traveling around the world with a dad like Arthur’s if you can’t understand what people are saying just because they sound a little different. He always felt smugly superior, even, when he’d catch shows on TV displaying subtitles under people speaking English with thick accents and he didn’t need them. 

Here’s what Arthur knew about that accent: It was Scottish. He knew that the man was _technically_ speaking English. Arthur caught ‘lads’ and ‘the way, here’, and he wasn’t an idiot. He extrapolated that the man in the car was looking for help, directions to or from somewhere. That was all. 

Inwardly, Arthur was disgusted with himself. He was supposed to be good at this. 

His self-hate only festered and bubbled more when Eames stepped forward with his stupid fake smile — Arthur had taken to thinking about it as Eames’ people-person smile — and began talking to the couple without any trouble. Less than no trouble, in fact. 

Eames started to answer back in a perfect Scottish accent. It was an exact mimic of how the man in the car sounded. The thing that really burned Arthur’s ass about it was that he had _no idea_ what Eames or the man was saying. 

He’d catch a few words. 

_“Just keep on up the road, aye.”_

_“Naw, never did.”_

_“Where’re you from?”_

But that was it. Eames leaned into the window and spoke first with the man, then winked at the woman in the passenger seat and brought her into his weird performance. At one point they all looked at and pointed to Arthur — and he definitely caught the word _Yank_ — and started laughing. They laughed even harder when they caught sight of Arthur bristling, but then the couple were gone. An arm thrown out the window and waving as they drove off. 

“That was fun,” Eames said in his actual voice and accent. 

“That was surreal,” Arthur commented, frowning so hard that he was acutely aware of his eyebrows. Eames smiled at him. Arthur didn’t have a name for the smile Eames used on him but it was only a matter of time before it was accurately categorized. “What the hell was that?”

Eames shrugged. “I’m good at accents.” 

“That was a little more than ‘good at accents’, Eames,” Arthur argued, and not only because he had until very recently considered himself good at accents. “So… I assume you’ve spent time in Scotland? They were Scottish, weren’t they?”

Now Arthur was questioning everything. This was terrible.

“They were Scottish, from just outside Glasgow. They’d gotten turned around looking for a shortcut, that’s all,” Eames explained. “And, no. I’ve never had the joy of spending any time in Scotland. Maybe one day I will? I assure you, I just like accents.” When Arthur didn’t respond to that Eames continued his explanation. Arthur didn’t ask him to do that but… it was useful to know the whole story, at least. 

“I told them I was from the city, since they weren’t, and we had a little giggle over the blank look on your face — which I don’t often get to see, you understand, so it was something of a wonder to me.” 

“Oh. So long as you were having fun,” Arthur grumbled. Was he hurt that he was left out of a joke or that he didn’t know that Eames could do this kind of thing or because he wasn’t as good at something as he thought he was? Arthur wasn’t even sure if he wanted to know the answer to that. 

“Now you’re getting it, Arthur.” 

Eames was always lying. Arthur had to remind himself of that. Eames was really good at lying, and that certainly wasn’t the reason why Arthur was grumpy about this brush with a different version of his con-man friend. 

Maybe he was just pissed about it because it was so easy to forget that Eames was who he was. Arthur had to stay vigilant all the time if he didn’t want to get caught off-balance. He hated that feeling. He hated that Eames made him feel like that for the first time since they had met. 

He’d be ready for it next time.

#

Arthur’s parents knew about Eames. 

They didn’t _know_ about Eames, though. 

His mother knew that Arthur had made friends with a civilian from the village, and his dad gave him the usual ‘don’t get too close’ talk, but they didn’t know that sometimes Arthur felt like Eames was the only topic he cared about. He looked forward to when Eames would come up in conversation with his mother. He thought about what Eames would think about his usual routine whenever they weren’t together. Once or twice, he dreamed about Eames. 

Arthur knew that his new friend was a complete charlatan, and that he couldn’t be trusted, and that their relationship — if you could call it that — wouldn’t last longer than his father’s time at this base. That didn’t stop Arthur from obsessing. There was no other word for it. Sometimes, he caught himself wishing that he could draw just so that he could try to capture that moment right before Eames smirked. The moment that almost seemed genuine. The precursor to a real smile before Eames slapped his mask on. 

Seeing as he was not gifted at all when it came to that kind of creativity, Arthur decided it would be much easier to just steal one of his mother’s cameras. He could just tell her that he wanted to take pictures of the countryside if she found out. He could draw maps to back it all up. Arthur was good at maps.

No, they didn’t _know_ about Eames. They barely _knew_ about Arthur. 

Arthur had a girlfriend in Germany when he was 14. His dad still talked about her. Sofia. Her existence gave Arthur’s dad something to hold onto. At least there was one girl, right? And if there was one girl then there could be others. 

It was possible. Other girls were possible. Arthur just hadn’t met them. He had really liked Sofia. She was smart and pretty. Dark hair and shockingly blue eyes. Funny. She liked Arthur, too. She didn’t think he was too sharp around his edges, which he knew he was. She had called him handsome even though Arthur knew he still hadn’t quite reached the handsome stage of life yet. There was still too much softness in his cheeks. He didn’t think she was a liar. Sofia just liked him. He liked her back. They were both a little sad about it when they had to break up because Sofia’s mom got a new post, but that’s just how it was.

He didn’t obsess over her. He didn’t really think that had anything to do with her being a girl, either. He never obsessed over anyone like he did with Eames. 

He was caught by his dad, once, kissing another boy when they were supposed to be in class. Arthur couldn’t remember his name. He remembered how much his dad had yelled. He remembered thinking that it was kind of a miracle that his dad was more angry about him ditching class than kissing a boy. He remembered how tired his dad sounded when he said _we won’t tell your mom all the details_. 

Arthur obsessed over that tone of voice on his dad. He obsessed over avoiding that boy after that. He obsessed over the idea that _knowing_ about him would hurt his mother more than it hurt his dad. He never obsessed over the boy.

Maybe it was because Eames lied, and maybe it was the way he smirked at Arthur whenever he caught him puzzling over a particular detail of his life, and maybe it was because Eames was the first person to give Arthur a nickname that didn’t sound harsh and cruel, or wasn’t some kind of insult. Maybe it was just because Eames was a little older than Arthur and so Arthur didn’t feel like he had to dumb down his conversation like he did with other people his age. Whatever it was, Arthur knew that he was obsessed. He didn’t really know what to do about it, which should have upset Arthur more than it did. Arthur wasn’t someone who spent much time not knowing what to do. 

Yet, with Eames, the lack of balance was part of the appeal. 

#

“I didn’t know you were interested in photography, darling,” Eames said as Arthur took the camera out of its case. He was teasing Arthur again, but it was fine. Arthur could weather it. 

“To know that you would have to ask me about myself sometimes,” Arthur pointed out. Eames just laughed and Arthur raised the camera — but he had missed his moment to catch the nearly-truth on Eames’ face. 

“You never give good answers,” Eames told him, then pouted dramatically before striking an extravagant pose against a nearby tree. He caught Arthur trying to get him in frame. “Should I stand a certain way for you? I’ll open my shirt buttons if you ask nicely.” 

“Define ‘nicely’,” Arthur answered. A deflection. It wouldn’t do any good to have Eames know how much he would like to see those buttons popped open. Arthur would never hear the end of it, probably. Arthur kept the camera trained on Eames. If he kept Eames talking then he’d get what he was looking for, surely. 

Eames gave him a warning look, mock-serious. “Careful, Arthur. You’re treading dangerously close to being fun right now. That would be terrible for your image.” 

“Answer the question, please.” Through the viewfinder, Arthur watched Eames push off the tree and move closer to Arthur. It was going to throw off his focus and Arthur really should have been more annoyed about that than he was. 

“I suspect that demanding something and tacking on a ‘please’ at the end is about as nice as it’s going to get with you, but I’m strangely at peace with that,” Eames said. He was smiling again. Arthur took the picture, hating how loud the shutter was, despite the 90% chance that he had missed the truth once more. “I suppose you could just ask me to open my shirt and see what happens.” 

Arthur sighed and brought the camera down. There was no way he was going to get anything useful out of Eames when he was performing so obviously. Maybe that one picture would be enough. Maybe he would get another chance at another time. “Very funny,” he muttered. 

“If you say so, Arthur.” 

#

Arthur’s mother wasn’t military. She was an artist. 

He didn’t tell Eames that because he knew that Eames would picture paints and brushes, canvases and bright colors. Eames mentioned wanting to study Fine Art when he finished school, and sometimes he showed sketches to Arthur. He was good. He had an eye for detail, and his copies of famous works were beautiful. It took everything Arthur was not to ask for a drawing from Eames to keep for himself. Even the idea of having something like that in his possession was almost like getting what he wanted, and that felt forbidden to Arthur. 

His mother wasn’t that kind of artist. She was an author. 

She made her money writing travel books because that was easiest to pair with their lives. She said that it was a perfect kind of accompaniment to Arthur’s dad’s career. It usually worked out well. However, she said, it was when she got to write for local papers that she felt lucky. 

She never called herself an artist. That was Arthur’s opinion alone. She used to create stories for him when he was younger instead of reading from the usual books for kids his age. She made him the hero of stories at first, but he told her that it didn’t feel right to him. After that, he was always the one who made sure the hero actually did his job. The wizard or the scholar or the smart owl on the branch above the headstrong hero, keeping an eye on things. They both knew that suited Arthur best, somehow. Her stories were beautiful to Arthur, and they were as much art as any painting or sketch. 

Arthur wasn’t creative like that. He knew that he could see what creative people saw. He could appreciate what they did. He just wasn’t one of them. 

His mother would say that she felt lucky when she could write for local papers. He never understood how or why, and he never asked just in case it drove a wedge between them. He couldn’t afford any major disagreements with his mother. He refused to lose her the way he had lost his father after that skipped class. No disagreements. No big questions. He congratulated her when she got hired to cover local interest. He didn’t have to pretend to be happy for her, at least. 

That was something. 

#

The first-morning ritual in a new country involved getting a collection of newspapers so that they could all take a look through them, as a family, and dad could decide which ones would be the best to buy while they were there. It was a tradition that had nothing to do with the Air Force, supposed American patriotism that they were still holding onto, or any lingering vestiges of organized religion. It was just for them, Arthur’s family, and no-one else. He loved it. 

Their first breakfast together in England brought with it the usual pile of paper and ink. They all grabbed one, scanned the front page, and then opened their choice. Dad’s looked like a collection of art and theater reviews. Not his avenue of expertise or interest. He moved on to the next paper with an exasperated sigh. Arthur’s mother had grabbed what looked like a tabloid, pure and simple. There were, in fact, four of such “papers” in the pile. 

Arthur’s mother made a face at the copy in her hands, discarded it without a word, then dedicated herself to finding more local newspapers. 

It was Arthur who got some kind of space between both extremes. He could see some mention of politics, though it seemed a little too sensational for his liking, plus some movie and music reviews, but the main headlines and pictures screamed tabloid. 

The pictures also screamed, _“Breasts!”_

Arthur didn’t care about them either way. They were _nice_ , sure, and they were obviously natural compared to any breast he had seen in porn magazines left around various USAF bases, but he didn’t care. That didn’t stop them from surprising him. 

He must have made a noise. His mother looked over first and yanked the paper from his hands. He didn’t protest. There was really no point; aside from his genuine indifference, Arthur wasn’t in the habit of trying to fight losing battles. The commotion caused his dad to look up. 

His dad took the paper. Chuckled. He did the most surprising thing to happen at that breakfast table, breasts included. He messed up Arthur’s hair with legitimate fondness. That wasn’t just surprising. That was… shocking. Turns out all that Arthur had to do to gain his father’s affection was to look at some tits sometimes. Typical. 

_”We’ll get rid of these for now, huh? Definitely not anything you want at the family table.”_ The words were scolding, but his dad was smiling.

It was so dumb. That rare moment of genuine affection stayed with Arthur and it was so dumb. He knew it was dumb and exactly why it burrowed its way into his head. But it was half of why, every so often, Arthur looked at those newspapers and magazines whenever he and Eames were passing time in the local corner store. He could never articulate any other reason to do so but Arthur was sure that there was more to it than that.

British corner stores had porn on display, just like their almost-newspapers. The idea, Arthur had gathered, was that if they were displayed high enough then children couldn’t reach them and therefore it was fine. If you were tall enough to see them, or reach them, then it was all fair game. 

Arthur was tall enough but he never tried to buy anything from those shelves. He probably should have at least tried. If it was his father’s approval he was looking for then even if he didn’t make it back to his house with the magazine, the story of him _trying_ and _failing_ to get a magazine full of tits would reach his dad — and his dad would be proud of him. Dumb. 

Eames teased him about it, once. 

“I could get you that, if you like,” he offered quietly. Almost sweetly. Arthur scowled at him as an answer, a look to stop hearts if only Arthur had that power, but it didn’t hinder Eames at all. Nothing ever stopped him. He gestured at one of the magazines, one with a blonde woman looking out at them with the strap of her black dress falling down from her shoulder. It was the most tasteful cover of all of the magazines on display. “I’m older… I wouldn’t have any problems.” 

“I don’t want you to buy me porn, Eames.” 

“Alright,” Eames threw his hands up in a peaceful display, but his smile promised verbal jabs to come for the foreseeable future. Arthur rolled his eyes and moved on from the magazines on the top shelf. Eames called after him so that he would be embarrassed when everyone looked at him. “Suit yourself, Arthur.”

Arthur seethed, face burning, and ignored Eames as he plotted his friend’s murder. 

He almost missed a conversation between Eames and an older woman, he was so focused on making sure Eames didn’t know that his loud teasing actually worked. The woman Eames was talking to was the kind of ‘older lady’ that placed her anywhere in her early sixties to early eighties. Arthur always had difficulty navigating his way through estimating ages. She was smiling at Eames and had a hand on his arm. He seemed just fine with all this, and was answering her questions just as kindly as she was asking them. 

“And your lovely mum; I haven’t seen her about in a while now,” the lady said. It was a question without asking a question. The British liked to do that a lot. Arthur was getting used to it. 

“Ah, yes. Well, mum’s been a tad busy. All that nastiness with the hearing and everything…” Eames answered, his face falling perfectly into controlled shame. Arthur pretended to flip through a (non-pornographic) magazine so that he could keep watching. Was it all an act, or was this actual truth coming from Eames’ lips?

“I hadn’t heard anything about any hearing,” the woman replied, her hand gripping Eames’ arm tightly. Eames put his free hand over hers. Comforting. “Not a local one?”

“No, Mrs. Morrison,” Eames shook his head, and his gaze trained down to the floor before taking a breath and meeting her eyes again. Arthur caught that it was an act then — though he had no way of knowing _why_ he knew. He just knew. Eames was lying. He had tears in his eyes, never falling. His words took on a stilted, ashamed, desperate cadence. Eames was lying again and it was _masterful_. “I’m afraid she had to go back to London for it. My father, as you know, lived there. I suppose he still lives there, but…” 

It took the woman, Mrs. Morrison, about a second to catch onto Eames’ meaning. She gasped softly and, perhaps out of kindness and perhaps to find a more private spot to get extra gossip, started to pull Eames towards where Arthur was hiding at the back of the shop near the beauty magazines, milk, and bread. 

“When did they take him away?”

“I suppose it must be… oh, it’s already months now,” Eames said. He was the perfect image of grief-stricken and shame-filled forgetfulness. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Morrison. I haven’t really spoken of it, and with mum down in London so often with family…” 

“No! No. Don’t you worry about it, my love,” Mrs. Morrison clucked softly. “I had no idea. Are you up here all by yourself? No other family?”

“I spend my time with my good friend here,” he said, nodding in Arthur’s direction and bringing Mrs. Morrison’s attention to him for the first time. “With my brother off with mum, it’s nice to have someone around.” 

And just like that, Arthur was an accomplice.

“You boys look after yourselves,” Mrs. Morrison told them, whispering like it was a secret. “And you’ll let me know if there’s anything I can bring you, Gordon. Don’t be polite about coming around. I always have scones in the oven. You can bring your friend, too, if you like.” 

Arthur smiled at her. He had no other choice. “That’s very kind,” he said quietly. His mother called it his _nice voice_. Eames raised eyebrows at Arthur while Mrs. Morrison’s attention was diverted. “I’ll be sure to get _Gordon_ to repay that kindness somehow.” 

Eames coughed and crumpled back into his facsimile of grief before Mrs. Morrison could catch his amusement. He squeezed her hand on his arm and nodded. “Arthur will keep me right, Mrs. Morrison, I assure you,” he murmured. “You are, indeed, a rare and kind heart. I’ll let my mum know you were asking for her.” 

They stayed where they were while Mrs. Morrison said her hushed goodbyes and her even quieter promises to keep it all to herself. Eames thanked her and Arthur inclined his head, and she offered to leave five pounds on the counter so that the boys could buy themselves something for their lunches. Arthur didn’t feel great about it, but they took her offer. 

They bought a lot of biscuits and obscene amounts of sugary soft chewy candy, since that was really all that was on offer. They didn’t say anything to each other for a long time. Arthur refused to be the one who broke first. He promised himself, when he first figured out that Eames liked to confuse people, that he would try to avoid asking Eames about his stories. He’d just ride the wave. 

Eames broke first. Arthur smiled at his hobnob. 

“You’re never going to let me live that down,” he declared. Arthur didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. “How is it that because of a silly little exchange with Mrs. Morrison, queen of the bingo hall, you find out my name? You must be so disorientated after being yanked from your blissed ignorance.”

Arthur snorted softly. “I don’t think I have any right to say anything about that,” he admits, no idea why he was being lenient. Eames couldn’t really be distressed. There was no real reason for Arthur to go easy on him, and yet. “My name is Arthur.” 

“Yes, it is, and it suits you,” Eames threw an arm over his eyes, shielding them from the sun and Arthur’s gaze. Very dramatic, and it allowed Arthur to look at Eames as much as he wanted to. “You’re very lucky, you know. Having a name that suits you.” 

“Lucky in a lot of ways, it seems. I have a name that suits me, and I don’t have a father who’s — wait, Eames, what was the story? He was arrested?” Arthur asked. He didn’t smile until Eames did, which didn’t take long at all. 

He would have said that Eames seemed pleased with himself, but Arthur would be wrong. It wasn’t that at all. He was pleased with _Arthur_. “You gem,” he praised in a triumphant whisper, his arm falling away from his face to show pure joy across his features. “You absolute gift, sent to me from on high. It was such a gamble to bring you in and then you were just _made_ to roll with the punches.” 

Arthur didn’t want to blush. That would be too much. He looked away. “It wasn’t fair to bring me in like that.” 

“Oh, you loved it.” 

“That’s not the point.” 

“So you _did_ love it,” Eames shoved Arthur’s leg, grin wide and playful. 

Arthur hated him. He hated that Eames was right. He hated that his heart thumped in his chest like it was its first time beating when Eames shoved him, hand heavy and warm even through Arthur’s clothes. Arthur hated every second of it. 

“Shut up,” he hissed viciously through bared teeth. 

Eames crowed in wordless victory. 

#

Whenever they had space Arthur’s mother would set up a darkroom. 

She taught him how to develop film when he was about 12 or 13, but he only really started to get good at it in the last two years. He didn’t need to be accompanied to develop photograph any longer, but the low lights and familiar smell of the chemicals always made him think of her. 

They had the space in the house in England and that excited the two of them to no end. Arthur’s dad even smiled a little when he told him that news. _Enough room for your pictures, too_. It was possible that Arthur’s dad had made a conscious effort to get them somewhere big enough for this kind of thing. Stranger things had been known to happen. 

Arthur developed pictures when his mother asked him to for the most part. She would have passion projects, or clusters of pictures of them as a family, or just pictures of wherever they were at the time. When she was working, and when Arthur wasn’t in school, it was a decent way to keep him occupied. She would come home from work and they’d be able to go through them, pick which ones to show Arthur’s dad when he got back from the base, and enjoy the whole process. 

Besides, Arthur liked the ritual of it. 

He liked being alone with some music and he liked knowing exactly what to do and when to do it. He liked getting the timing right on the exposure. He liked knowing which developer was the best. He liked setting the timers and reaching the right temperatures. He liked being precise and correct, and he especially liked coming out of it with results. 

Arthur had finished his roll of film with a shot of Eames looking down at something, and by some miracle he had taken the picture at sunset. He wanted to know if he actually caught the moment, and he wanted to skip straight to it, but there were so many other shots that he had forgotten about. Shot after shot, some blurry or badly framed, but all attempts to catch Eames at his best. 

There was no way to pin down what Arthur was searching for in these pictures beyond that. _Eames at his best_. He had no other words for the expression. He had previously thought of it as Eames’ only honest moment, this fleeting thing, but it wasn’t just that. It was complicated.

The time got away from him. He didn’t realize that he was surrounding himself with drying pictures of Eames smiling or talking or eating or pointing to something out of frame or walking away or with an eyebrow raised. Side profiles and shots in shadow. Arthur didn’t realize that he hadn’t taken any pictures of the countryside like he’d promised his mother. 

He didn’t realize any of that, so when there was a knock on the door Arthur just answered to say that it’s fine, everything’s developed now, it was safe to open. He knew it would be his mother. He wasn’t really thinking. 

He didn’t even look up until he heard her say, so softly: _“Oh, Arthur.”_

He never said a word to her. He just watched her look at all the photographs and followed the hushed suggestion that they should _clean these up_. He just did what she said and nodded silently. 

_”We don’t have to tell your dad about this.”_

Arthur closed his eyes, the stack of photos hidden away in a brown folder like a state secret and pressed against his chest, and he felt like an empty room. Arthur nodded. Agreed with her. 

They didn’t talk again until dinner. They hadn’t needed words to understand each other in the past, and it was no different now. Whenever they did speak, neither of them mentioned what Arthur’s mother had seen in the darkroom. 

After dinner, Arthur put the folder of photographs in a box under his bed. 

#

There was no point in telling Eames why he was upset. That would make everything worse. That much was obvious. Everything Arthur touched turned to shit. 

Eames knew better than to ask, anyway. 

When he found Arthur sitting on the wall across from his house, Eames kept his mouth shut. He bumped Arthur’s shoulder with his own in silence and gestured that Arthur follow him with an inclined head. 

He led Arthur down to the village, to a spot behind the library where there were no cameras, no windows, no lights. Still silent, he took out a battered 10-pack of cigarettes from an inside pocket in his jacket. He lit two cigarettes at once, plucked one of them from his lips and gave it to Arthur. 

Wordlessly, Arthur accepted. Wordlessly, Eames made him feel a little better. 

#

“Do you think you’ll miss me when you move?” 

Arthur looked up at Eames with a frown. They were meant to be going through each other’s book and comic collection to see what they might want to trade, but Eames had only brought two ratty old Dandy comics and had made himself very comfortable on Arthur’s bed since arriving. Arthur was sitting on the floor and he was trying to find something that Eames might want to keep. 

That paperback on Arcimboldo, maybe, if he could ever figure out where it had been packed before the move. 

“Why are you asking me that?” 

Eames shrugged. “I think I’ll miss having you around, Arthur,” he said instead of answering Arthur’s question directly. Eames never answered anything directly. “Who else will look at me with such distinctive disdain?” 

“Believe me, you’ll find someone,” Arthur rolled his eyes and stretched as much as he could to reach another box of books. His voice strained as he spoke. “You’re uniquely annoying and it won’t take long before you’re teasing and lying to someone new and interesting. Besides, we’re not going for a while. Dad’s here for at least a year.” 

Eames’ eyebrows ticked down into something that could be a frown if he weren’t always hiding behind that smirk. “What makes you think that I’m lying to you, darling?”

“You can stop with the darlings, too,” Arthur growled with effort. He gave a soft and triumphant _aha_ as he got the box and pulled it over to him without needing to physically get up. Victory. “It’s not funny.” 

“You say things like that all the time but I don’t remember trying to be funny,” Eames answered evenly. Arthur craned his neck and, sure enough, he was sitting there doing his best impression of someone with hurt feelings. Arthur sighed — and only because he was annoyed that Eames’ ploy was working on him. He was a sucker but at least he knew that he was a sucker. 

Was he really being conned if he wanted to be conned? Was he really a mark if he could see all of the moves Eames was making? Arthur asked himself that a lot. 

He raised his hands in peace. “Okay. Fine. Your adorable pet names for me are _genuine_ and you will miss me terribly when I’m gone,” he said but he knew that his sarcasm was too biting, too jagged, to be taken as an olive branch. He tried again, softer this time. He spoke into the box of books. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring it up.” 

That much was true, at the very least. 

There was enough silence hanging between them that Arthur had to look up again. Their eyes met. That odd little tick in Eames’ eyebrows again. It was like a tell. Arthur wondered what Eames was like at poker. “But you still think I’m lying to you.” It wasn’t a question. 

Arthur didn’t look away. Eames’ eyes still held that intensity that Arthur had always read as some kind of promise of mischief, some ridiculous call to do something against the rules, but he had been wrong. That was just Eames. That was just how he looked. It wasn’t mischief in his eyes at all but a razor sharp intellect. Arthur had been an idiot not to see it before. 

He’d never seen Eames without his smirk before. It was awful, in a way, to find that Eames was just as beautiful without it. It was cruel to have him look that good when he seemed so hurt. 

“Does it matter if I know you’re lying?” Arthur asked. It was an honest question. Did it ruin it for Eames if he knew that Arthur knew? Eames lied all the time and Arthur just let him. It was fine. “I don’t care if you are. Obviously I don’t care. You have to understand that.”

He didn’t get a response straight away. Eames just sat up from where he was on Arthur’s bed, swung his legs around and planted his feet on the floor. It felt like Eames sat there in silence for too long, far too long, and Arthur just let him. It couldn’t have been more than ten seconds but it didn’t feel right. 

It got worse as he watched Eames build up his mask of smiles and friendliness right in front of him. From those ticked down eyebrows and blank expression slowly — so slowly — back to a pleasant smile and slightly cocked head. 

Arthur felt sick. Arthur never felt sick.

“Right you are, Arthur,” Eames said brightly. There was no hint of hurt on his voice anymore but it still felt bland. Flat. Arthur had made a huge mistake. _This_ was what it was like when Eames lied to him and Arthur had never actually seen it before. He’d seen something else, and it was too much like a punch in the face to admit that what he had seen was the truth all this time. “Anyway, I suppose I should let you get back to it. You keep those comics, if you like. They’re not terribly fancy, but I thought you might get a bit of a chuckle from them. See you later, then?” 

He was already at the bedroom door by the time Arthur had scrambled onto his feet. “Eames, wait—”

“Don’t worry,” Eames cut him off. That disgusting fake smile on his face. “You will. I just need to take a walk, that’s all.” 

Eames turned and left and Arthur just let him. 

#

The problem with accepting all of Eames’ vague answers in the past was that Arthur was now lost. 

It was a small enough village. Everyone knew each other. They had only been there about two months, give or take a week, and there were already little old ladies who asked Arthur how his mother was whenever he was in the corner shop. There were only so many places people could live around here. Arthur’s dad had managed to get them a little cottage just a little away from a new-ish housing estate, and when Arthur had asked Eames where he lived he just accepted the answer of _around here_. 

He assumed that Eames lived in the estate since mostly everyone he had spoken to so far did. There was a smaller, older, bunch of houses on the other side of the village though. A handful of cottages and old farmhouses dotted around the countryside outside of the village itself. He could be there instead. He could be anywhere. 

When Arthur decided to go looking for him, two days after Eames left his room with that terrible smile on his face, and after suffering complete radio silence the entire time, Arthur just assumed that it would be as easy as going to the nearest housing estate and finding him. 

Which had been stupid of him, yes, but Arthur was starting to suspect that every adult who had praised him for his superior intelligence had been blowing smoke directly up his ass. 

Somehow, Eames wasn’t just standing outside some two-storey-semi-detached with his name plastered on it. He wasn’t under a blinking sign with a neon arrow pointing at him, all for Arthur’s convenience. Arthur couldn’t even ask anyone for help. How would he even go about asking those kinds of questions without answering a bunch of them himself? Arthur didn’t have the energy for that kind of thing, he decided, while he was busy looking for Eames.

That’s how he found himself lost. 

He knew how to get home. He wasn’t that kind of lost. Arthur was the kind of lost that meant he was walking without a destination in mind. He was looking for something with no idea where it was, and no idea where to start. He was on his way to a conversation but he didn’t even know how to start it, let alone what would be said in the end. He had a paperback under his arm full of glossy pictures of proto-surrealist paintings and he didn’t even know if that would be seen as a peace offering or a bribe. Both?

It was definitely both. 

#

He’d have to steal a bike, but Arthur knew that he could make it to some forgotten knoll in the Cotswolds within a few hours. He was reasonably sure that he would be able to find a ditch there to lay down and die in. His mother would be upset. He felt bad about that. But he knew that his parents were young enough to start a new family if they really wanted to. 

Arthur’s dad could take another crack at having a son he could look at. That had to count for something.

The only problem with the plan was the lack of a bike. Arthur supposed that he could hitchhike if he couldn’t easily find one to steal. He rested against the same tree that Eames had once posed by, slowly letting gravity take hold of him. The slide down to the ground was this side of pathetic but who was going to stop him?

He had his head in his hands when he heard footsteps. He didn’t move. He didn’t care who saw him right now. At least it wasn’t raining, he thought, and at least it hadn’t rained properly for a few days. He wasn’t sitting in a damp patch of mud. That was something. 

“You look positively tragic, Arthur.” Eames’ voice. Teasing. Familiar. 

Arthur looked up from his hands and tried to manage his expression. It was a miracle that Eames was standing right there in front of him, let alone talking to him, and Arthur didn’t want to overreact. Somewhere in the swamps of his mind Arthur knew that he shouldn’t be worried about letting Eames see emotion on his face — and especially when he was already looking so undignified — but he just couldn’t stop himself. The only thing Arthur had was his control over himself.

“Where have you been?” he asked. Eames came to sit beside him. There was more than enough room by the tree for them to sit in the shade and not be pressed together, but Eames never cared about personal space. Arthur didn’t find himself caring about it much either in the moment. 

“I’ve been looking for you,” Eames answered. He frowned when Arthur started to laugh. “What’s funny?”

“You have not been looking for me. I’ve either been at home or I’ve been looking for you,” Arthur pointed out. Eames was lying again. Arthur wasn’t even mad about it. It felt familiar. He looked at Eames closely. “Where the hell do you live? I have no idea. I was just walking around like an idiot.” 

“Did you break the village map into a lettered grid so you could search more efficiently?” Eames asked sweetly. Arthur wondered why he was looking for the asshole in the first place when he hated Eames more than he had ever hated anyone in the world. 

“You’re avoiding the question.” 

“Ah. You’ve caught me. I am,” Eames leaned his head back against the tree. He was quiet again for a few seconds. Arthur held his breath and listened to the wind. “I don’t have a reason that you’ll enjoy, Arthur. I just thought it might be fun to have some mystery surrounding me.” 

Arthur rolled his eyes. “There’s nothing but mystery surrounding you. You never actually answer a question when it’s asked.” 

“That’s not true,” Eames protested. He sounded tired. “I told you about my brother. I told you about my father, too, the real story. You know loads about me — you just don’t believe me.” 

“I know that your dad is either in prison or he’s just some guy in London,” Arthur said. Eames snorted softly. “I know that you _told_ me that you have a twin brother, and I think we can both agree that you only told me that to mess with me.” The very idea of there being two people in the world who look like Eames… “You do a lot of things to mess with me.” 

“It’s not like that—”

Arthur waved away Eames’ excuse, or his explanation, or whatever it was going to be. He really wasn’t mad. He didn’t want Eames to think he was mad, or even hurt. He was neither. At the very least, he didn’t think he felt either of those emotions when it came to Eames. “I told you; I don’t mind. I _should_ mind but I obviously have emotional problems.” 

“Obviously.” 

Eames didn’t look at Arthur but he grinned up at the leaves above them before his face melted back into a more serious expression. Arthur didn’t know why it chose that moment, but his adrenaline spiked. A rare fight or flight response. He exhaled. 

“I don’t lie to you, Arthur,” he said. Like it was the simplest thing in the world. “Please don’t misunderstand. I’m not saying I don’t lie. Quite clearly, everyday, I like to…” He waggled his fingers. “Let’s just say that I play around with the truth a bit. And I don’t know what it is about you but I never wanted to do that to you. One person should know the truth, shouldn’t they? Of all the stories out there in the world, just one should be correct.” 

He finally looked at Arthur. Another spike in adrenaline. “I’m perfectly comfortable with you being the only one who knows the truth.”

“Which is?” Arthur knew what he was asking but he didn’t know if Eames knew. He was off-balance again. Nothing was solid around Eames, yet Arthur never felt more like himself than when he was with Eames. 

Eames sighed, but he didn’t look away again. “The truth is that you might be the only friend I’ll ever truly have or trust, Arthur. It really is a pity that you’re such a humorless prick.”

They shared a smile. 

“Sorry,” Arthur apologized and meant it. He wouldn’t wish his friendship on anyone, especially not anyone he actually liked. “If it’s any consolation at all, I think you might be my best friend.” 

Eames sucked his teeth, disappointment plain on his face, and Arthur’s blood ran cold. That was the wrong thing to say. “I wish you hadn’t said that,” Eames said quietly. Arthur wanted to disappear. He wanted to have never existed. He longed for that ditch in the middle of nowhere in the middle of England where no-one would find him. Eames shook his head. “It would all be much better if you hated me, really.” 

“Sorry,” Arthur said again. This time his voice was a knife. Eames winced. 

“I’m leaving for London next week to stay with my dad,” Eames said in explanation, and he was a picture of patience in the face of Arthur’s jagged hurt and anger. “Mum’s been busy trying to convince him to take me for the rest of the summer before I go off to uni. That’s why she hasn’t been around, and why I didn’t really want to talk about where I live, and why it would be much easier if you hated the sight of me. I’ll be out of your hair soon, after all.” 

Arthur didn’t understand Eames’ words straight away. It all felt very unreal. He’d always been the one who left to go to another place. He had always been the one giving this kind of news, and he only expected to be on the receiving end when he made friends with other army brats. It wasn’t supposed to happen with civilians. 

Eames clicked his tongue to fill the silence. 

His moment was slipping away from him, and Arthur struggled to come up with what needed to be said. He had a week left with Eames, and he had already dropped that ridiculous _you’re my best friend_ bomb, so he had no intention of making the rest of their time unnecessarily weird. Eames said that he told Arthur the truth, but Eames didn’t know all of the truth about Arthur — and he didn’t need to. He didn’t need to know about the photos and he didn’t need to know about the dreams and he didn’t need to know about why Arthur’s mother was so quiet these days. 

Arthur tried to make it as simple as possible. 

“I don’t hate you, Eames.” 

#

They were walking back to Arthur’s house because it had started to mist over. Eames had said, sometime in the last week, that it was _a bit of magic, mark my words_ that it hadn’t rained for a few days. The most that Arthur had experienced so far was an annoying drizzle that made you feel like you were sweating and sticky when you weren’t. Arthur wasn’t a fan, though at the moment he didn’t feel like complaining; for some reason, the misting drizzle prompted Eames to offer to walk Arthur home. 

Under different circumstances Arthur would have told Eames to throw himself into a lake at the insinuation that he wouldn’t be able to make his way back home alone but — well, things were a little different in the moment. 

“Here,” Arthur said, passing the art book to Eames without looking at him. “I was going to give this to you for the comics.” 

Eames flipped through the pages once or twice before stopping. “You dolt. Why did you give me this when it’s raining? I can’t look at it right now or it’ll be ruined,” he complained and it definitely sounded like he was upset about that. Arthur glanced at him. 

“Read it or don’t,” he said with a shrug. “It’s yours to ruin. I’m not expecting you to give it back before you go or anything.” 

“Mm,” Eames hummed, then hunched weirdly while they walked so that he could open the cover under his jacket. He looked up at Arthur, stricken. “You didn’t leave a note or anything! _Arthur_ , honestly. How am I supposed to look fondly upon this gift if there’s no heartfelt message to moon over? It’s like you don’t even try.” 

Arthur blinked at Eames. “You are literally the only person in the world who would dare to insinuate that I’m lazy.” 

“Ah, yes, well,” Eames tucked the book under his arm and grinned. “I do believe I’m also the only person in the world who knows you so well. I have a right to call you lazy.” 

“I’ll allow it. But only you. No-one else,” Arthur said, like it was a warning. Like he had any control over it. But he liked the way Eames smiled at him when he said it, so he didn’t take it back. 

“How is it that I know you so well, yet know nothing about you?” Eames asked after a few seconds of companionable silence. 

Arthur lifted an eyebrow at him. “If you really were telling the truth all this time, you don’t know half as much about me as I know about you. You never asked,” he said, and Eames nodded. “Alright. Do you want to ask me something?”

“Do you promise to tell the truth?”

“All of it, within reason, so long as it doesn’t incriminate me.” 

“Now you have me intrigued, Arthur,” Eames bumped his shoulder playfully before chewing on his lip, deep in thought. Choosing a question. Arthur’s heart thumped so hard in his chest that it hurt. “I think I have one. Scars. Do you have any?”

“Why do you want to know about that?” Arthur laughed, surprised and just a little delighted. He was expecting Eames to ask… well, anything else. Not that. Who cared about scars?

Eames did. “Call me weird if you must, but I would just like to know.” 

“Okay? I have a scar from my hip to the back of my thigh, all the way around. I thought I could take on a training course that was way too hard for me at the time, and I paid for it,” Arthur told Eames. It was true. The only people who knew about that scar were his parents. Even the kid who Arthur was trying to impress didn’t know how bad the injury had been; Arthur had been left there in the mud while the kid panicked and ran. “There was a metal hook out of place — the main reason why the course didn’t have anyone running it, obviously — so when I slipped, it caught me.” 

“Jesus, Arthur.” 

“Yeah, it was pretty crazy,” Arthur laughed softly, thinking back. “There was a lot of blood.” 

“You little freak,” Eames said. His tone, low and fond and amused, made Arthur’s stomach flip, which was a bit of a problem. Arthur would have to put that on the pile of problems he had developed when it came to Eames, and he resolved to keep an eye on it. “I’m going to ask another.” 

“No, wait. Do you have any scars?”

“Totally unblemished, darling. At least for now,” Eames replied smoothly, and winked, and Arthur had to briefly look away. Arthur had already said that he didn’t mind it when Eames played with him like that. He might have craved it, in fact, but that was something he needed to keep to himself. “My turn. What’s your last name?”

“Oh. Don’t laugh,” Arthur instructed and rolled his eyes. “It’s Hardt.” 

“Why would I laugh?” Eames asked, innocent as a kitten. Arthur scowled at him. 

“Shut up, Gordon.” 

“Alright, fair dues. Do you have anything else to ask me?” 

They were halfway to Arthur’s house. It wasn’t enough time. He could offer to bring Eames inside but the threat of Arthur’s mother finding them talking together _in her own house_ made Arthur’s stomach turn to lead. He’d have to cover everything, and quickly. 

“Actual siblings?”

“I told you; I have a twin brother. You’d like him, I think. Everyone likes him,” Eames waggled his fingers in that way he did and his face twisted into a sarcastic looking grimace. Jealousy, Arthur recognized too slowly. That was what it looked like on Eames’ face. “He’s kind and he’s funny. Probably going to end up being a doctor, too, the prick.” 

That was another thing. “What do you want to do?”

“It’s my turn to ask, Arthur,” Eames reminded him. Arthur hadn’t forgotten. 

“I don’t care,” he shook his head, unapologetic. “Tell me. What do you want to do with your life? Are you going to stay around here or…?”

Eames looked away this time. “Do you think anyone actually knows the answer to that question, or do they just know what other people want them to say?” He didn’t give Arthur enough time to answer. “I’m going to study art. I know there’s no money in it, but I’ve been aiming for Oxford all my life without much say in the matter. I might as well do something I like and I’m good at.” 

“Why Oxford?”

“Mum teaches there. She may as well live there,” Eames explained simply, dead-eyed and low-voiced for a moment before brightening up. Changing the subject. Arthur wished that he knew how to bring the topic back up. Eames didn’t have to be the only one dealing with a distant parent. But Arthur couldn’t think of a way to bring it up again. He stayed silent and let Eames move on. “I have one for you, Arthur. You’re going to hate it.” 

Arthur flapped his hand to dismiss the obvious question on Eames’ lips. “Yes, I’ve kissed people. No, I haven’t had sex yet. Next.” 

Eames’ mouth formed a perfect ‘o’ of surprise before his face split into a very wide, _very_ smug, smile. “That’s not what I was going to ask.” 

Arthur frowned. “Yes, it was.” 

“No. That was what I’d like to call a freebie,” Eames said, then thew an arm around Arthur’s neck and pulled him in close. English boys did it all the time; grabbing each other and hanging from each other, braying loudly while they did it. Arthur had seen it in the village when there were groups of them about. It was the first time Eames had tried something like that with him. 

Eames smelled like cigarettes and wet grass, with some musky deodorant underneath it all. 

Arthur wanted to stay exactly where he was. He couldn’t allow himself that, so he made a show of getting free. He shoved Eames off him and punctuated Eames’ awful laughter with a quick punch on his arm. Eames rubbed the spot that Arthur knew hurt more than he was letting on. And then he asked the worst question of all. 

“’People’?”

“Next fucking question, Eames,” Arthur growled and, in his mercy, Eames let the topic go. His smile stayed plastered on his face, but he left it all alone. Arthur still felt like an idiot. 

“Where are you from originally?”

“America,” Arthur answered sarcastically. Eames snorted, but he gave Arthur a look that suggested his answer wasn’t enough. “I was born in Las Vegas. I still have family there.” 

“Can you teach me how to count cards?” Eames had started to slow down his pace even though the drizzle had turned into actual rain and any normal person would be running for shelter. 

“Just because I’m from Vegas doesn’t mean I can count cards.” Arthur wasn’t running for shelter either.

“Ah, but you can.” Eames didn’t miss a beat. 

Arthur grunted. “Yes.” 

“And you can teach me.” 

“…yes.”

Eames laughed and, despite himself, Arthur was smiling again. They didn’t say anything or ask any more questions. It was raining, and Arthur could see his front door coming into view, closer and closer with each step, and they were getting drenched, and he should have hated every part of it. He should have hated Eames knowing that much about him. 

He didn’t.

“I’ll see you later?” Eames checked. He didn’t ask to come inside and Arthur was thankful that he didn’t have to make up a lie about why Eames couldn’t dry off inside after all their transparency. 

It was difficult not to offer, though. Eames stood at the bottom of the path leading to the front door, hand still under his coat to protect the book that Arthur gave him, and he acted as though the rivulets of rainwater streaming down his face weren’t bothering him. He looked drowned and devastating and Arthur swallowed every ounce of whatever it was he was feeling until his body ached with it. 

“I’ll call you,” he answered, and Eames raised an eyebrow. A wordless request for more information again. Arthur rolled his eyes, but responded. “I’m not doing anything tomorrow and my mom is going to be busy at work. I’ll call you.” 

“A pleasure, as always, Arthur,” Eames inclined his head a bit, like a bow, needless and just this side of formal, before turning around and leaving. It was an annoying way to say goodbye to anyone. 

Arthur didn’t hate that, either. 

When he got into the house, he found his mother at the table in the kitchen. She had papers and photographs and hand-written notes spread out everywhere. In the not-so-distant past, Arthur would have sat down with her and asked if he could help. He would have enjoyed that. 

His mother looked up, caught sight of Arthur, and looked puzzled. She looked him over, then behind him. The glass in the top half of the door. Arthur followed her gaze just in time to catch sight of Eames disappearing down the lane. 

When he looked back to her he realized that he had been smiling because he wasn’t any longer. His mother wasn’t looking at him anymore. 

The whole exchange was done in silence, and took all of two seconds, but they had never needed words to understand each other. 

#

Arthur was staring at a blank page. The pen in his hand went from resting in his mouth, to being twirled, to being thrown up and caught, to finding itself lodged between his teeth. It was slobbish behavior and of course Arthur would never be caught acting this way in front of anyone except Eames. 

Their exchange of truths had done wonders for Arthur’s calm, he had to hand it to Eames. It was a revelation to trust someone. The only thing that was getting to Arthur was that they only had a few days left of this upgraded friendship. 

Maybe it was the quality of their friendship, as well as the jumble of complicated feelings inside Arthur’s chest whenever Eames laughed at a joke or turn of phrase, that was causing him to just stare at the blank page instead of writing on it. 

“If you don’t stop tormenting that pen then I am going to confiscate it, Arthur,” Eames frowned at Arthur and, when he was unceremoniously ignored, he snatched the pen from Arthur’s hand. “Why is this proving so difficult? Just write something nice for me. ‘From Arthur, hope you enjoy’. That kind of thing. It’s exceedingly simple.” 

“If it’s that simple then why do you need me to write anything in the first place?” Arthur grumbled. “Just imagine the message you want from me and it will be perfect.”

Eames shrugged. “The real thing would be nice to have. You don’t have notes in your books from relatives or friends?”

“At this point, haven’t you figured out that I’m not exactly the kind of person who has millions of friends? And don’t get me started on family,” Arthur rolled his eyes. He barely spoke to his father on good days and he was in the middle of mourning the loss of his relationship with his mother. That connection was well and truly severed. It was sad, and Arthur found himself feeling empty and alone at night, but he managed to keep himself together during the day. 

It was what it was, he reasoned with himself. These things happened to people all the time. Arthur wasn’t special. 

Eames sighed quietly and gave Arthur his pen back. “Would you like one?”

“What, a family?” Arthur smiled grimly and started to tap the butt of the pen on the page. “If there are extra ones going for free then I’ll take a look but I’ve already invested a lot of time in the one that I have.” 

“No, you horror,” Eames grinned. “A note. You know; ‘To Arthur. I regret leaving you before the summer had really started, but know that I will return once more to corrupt you further. Love, Eames’.” 

Arthur looked up from the blank page. His chest hurt and he knew why, but he didn’t want to put a name to it. Eames did this to him all the time and Arthur had already said he didn’t mind. Eames did this all the time but he didn’t mean it. It was always accidental. It had to be accidental because, if it wasn’t, then Eames was just cruel.

Eames shrugged again. “Something like that, anyway. I would no doubt do better if I had ample time to think about it.” 

“Not so simple, is it,” Arthur deadpanned. He tore his eyes away from Eames’ and looked back at the page.

_To Eames,_

He stopped, his mind stalled again. “I’d rather you didn’t give me a book with a note in it, anyway,” he said. “I have boxes full of books that will just need to get packed up again at the end of my dad’s post. I’ve lost more books in moves than I’ve read, or ever will read. If you do end up leaving me a note or whatever, I don’t want to lose it.” 

“Alright. So I won’t get you a book,” Eames agreed. “I need to produce something you’ll never lose.” 

“Nothing’s permanent, Eames.” 

“Bleak nonsense. I’d wager I could come up with something that will stay with you,” Eames replied, cocksure and determined. The look on his face was dangerous, or inviting, and Arthur at least knew then that they agreed on one thing. 

Eames was definitely a corrupting element. 

#

The weather was beautiful. Arthur felt warm for the first time since arriving in England, to the point where he was just wearing a button-down with the sleeves rolled up instead of a shirt, a sweater over it, and a large coat over that. The sun was higher in England than in the States, or that’s how it felt. Like it was further away, or smaller. Under different circumstances it would have made Arthur feel great to see a nice day instead of a mild one, or a rainy one. It should have been raining. It would have made more sense in Arthur’s head if it were raining. 

Eames was leaving that evening. 

“Mum has a plan to drive me halfway to London, where dad’ll be waiting in a parking lot to pick me up,” he explained, and Arthur watched with only a little amusement as Eames’ features scrunched up in disgust. “Like a drug deal, you understand. They won’t make eye contact or say a word to each other. Everything has been agreed upon over the phone.” 

“Sounds efficient.” 

“You’re awful, really,” Eames accused and Arthur was inclined to agree. 

“You’ll be free of me soon enough,” Arthur said with a sigh that he couldn’t help. Eames looked at him sideways. 

Arthur pretended as though he didn’t notice. He was pretending not to notice a lot of things. He wasn’t noticing the tick of his watch as the minutes just fell away from them. He wasn’t noticing that this is the first and last time that he’ll see Eames wearing a loose-fitting and offensively bright shirt, with buttons opened just enough at the neck to show Eames’ clavicle. It made Arthur feel like a Victorian pervert. He was doing his absolute _best_ to not notice that. 

They didn’t even do much that day. They walked, and they talked to Mrs. Morrison in the corner shop. Eames convinced her that he was going to live with his aunt in London for a bit, since _everyone’s still a bit out of sorts and the poor love will need a hand, won’t she?_ and then Eames walked Arthur home for the last time. 

Arthur’s dad was waiting at the house to bring him to the base. They had new models flying in that day, and it was the only thing they could bond over as father and son. Arthur usually wouldn’t want to skip it but it felt different that day, with Eames giving him a quick quirk of a smile as a goodbye. 

They didn’t say anything to each other. They didn’t hug or talk, not with Arthur’s dad tapping the roof of the car to get Arthur’s attention. Arthur waved from the car, and Eames smiled, and that was the end of it. 

#

“That was your English friend today,” Arthur’s dad said at dinner. It wasn’t a question, but he was asking all kinds of things. He looked at Arthur from over his beer, meaningful in a way Arthur recognized but couldn’t interpret. 

“Yes,” Arthur sat up a little straighter. “His name is Eames.” 

“His last name?”

“Most likely,” Arthur answered and he didn’t know why he wasn’t being completely transparent, but he felt like he was doing the right thing. His dad seemed to approve; maybe he liked that Arthur didn’t know everything about Eames, or that he wasn’t talking about him too much. 

“Is he your only friend around here?” Arthur’s mother asked, for the first time acknowledging Eames’ presence as a living human. It was difficult not to look shocked but Arthur was confident that he pulled it off. “You should talk to more people, Arthur. I don’t like the idea of you spending your time with only one person.” 

“A bad element?” His dad asked, but he wasn’t asking Arthur. Arthur wasn’t part of the conversation. 

“I’ve never heard anything _good_ about the boy,” his mother responded. 

Arthur closed his eyes, took a breath, and then told them what they needed to know. What they wanted to know. “You don’t need to worry about him,” he assured them. “He left for London today, and I doubt he’ll be back.” 

Eames said he’d be back, but how likely was it that Arthur would be there to meet him? It was probably best not to think about it like that, and his parents didn’t need to know that detail. 

“Oh. That’s something,” Arthur’s mother chirped, and put a little more salad on his plate. “No point in worrying about a bad influence if he’s not around.” 

His dad agreed with a pleased-sounding grunt. “Happy to hear it was just a passing thing.” 

For the first time in two weeks, Arthur’s mother reached out and squeezed his arm. Touched him willingly. They didn’t think he noticed, but his parents shared a look over his head. They must have been relieved. 

Arthur finished his dinner in silence. 

#

_To Eames,  
I don’t make friends easily. I know that if it was up to me, we wouldn’t be friends at all. Thanks for sticking with me.   
I’ll never be considered an artist by anyone, and rightly so, but I know what I like. I can only hope that you’ll get as much of a kick out of the way Arcimboldo plays with common perception as I do.  
Yours,  
Arthur_

#

Arthur heard about it before he saw it. 

It was the day after Eames had left, and Arthur’s mother was on the phone to work, and she was a special mix of angry and elated that made Arthur pay attention. Something had happened that meant she got to cover a fun story and that was rare when they were living in less densely populated areas. Despite everything, he was happy for her. 

“What do you mean, they’re everywhere? They can’t be everywhere.” 

She scribbled a single word on the pad next to the phone and punctuated it with three question marks, which seemed a little deranged to Arthur so, naturally, he took a peek at what she had written. 

_Dots_. 

#

They weren’t _everywhere_. 

Dots of nearly every color covered the library and four surrounding buildings. When Arthur arrived on the scene with his mother, there was already a considerable crowd murmuring about the sight. Someone in the crowd declared it mindless vandalism and several people murmured soft British agreements. 

A few of the local kids, all around Arthur’s age, hung around the edges of the crowd and laughed. 

Arthur wasn’t particularly interested in being in either camp. Under normal circumstances he would wander around aimlessly until he found Eames or until Arthur himself was found. That wasn’t going to happen, but he decided he was still going to wander. He bid his mother goodbye until lunchtime, and found himself walking towards the tree where Eames had found him before. Arthur didn’t know when he started considering the tree as their meeting spot, but it had just happened that way. 

He sat there, the weather still warm and this side of lovely, and looked at the crowd of people from afar. Detached from the commotion, the dots looked beautiful. The colors meshed together almost like the reds, blues, and yellows of newspaper print. In fact— 

Arthur frowned at the scene below him, then leaned to the left. Only part of the building around the library were vandalized. From here it was obvious that the dots cut off seemingly at random and when Arthur moved his head, when he moved at all, his perspective shifted with the dots. 

They were meant to make an image, and Arthur was nearly in the right spot to see it. There was a line of dots that could be a letter, or an eyeball, and Arthur’s heart pounded in his chest. There was no possible way… 

Arthur had to actually _climb the fucking tree_ , at which point he gave up pretending as though he didn’t know who was behind the dots and he began to actively curse Eames’ name, but once he was up there he could see it. Plain as day. Eames’ note, in giant and small and medium-sized multicolored dots plastered across the library and neighboring buildings. 

_To Arthur._

#

There was an effort made by the whole village, Arthur included, to paint over the dots and make sure that everything went back to its usual look. Arthur’s mother got him to take pictures of the buildings for her article, which was her way of saying that she was comfortable with him again. 

Still, Arthur felt no guilt when he took the camera up to the top of the tree and got as many shots of his note as he could before it was gone. He developed the photographs himself and made sure he kept both the prints and the negatives private. He kept them in the brown folder under his bed. 

No-one suspected that Arthur knew anything about the vandalism. Why would he? He only knew one person in the village, not counting Mrs. Morrison, and that one person had disappeared for the big city. Arthur was never even asked about it, though he knew that a few of the village kids got interrogated and even blamed for it. It was remarkable, but Eames had managed to lie to an entire town without saying a single word. 

The only person who knew the truth was Arthur.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You have unlocked: The Real Ending

Arthur’s dad stayed for the full year, and he started to talk about the possibility of a promotion on the horizon. Arthur’s mother stopped writing for the local paper after a few months, though she stayed friends with the people who worked there. She went back to writing for herself and staying at home. It was normal. It was nice. 

It was boring. 

Fall arrived and went. Winter felt like a slap in the face. Spring barely existed, but time moved forward. 

For the first few months Arthur thought that maybe Eames was just waiting for the holidays to make a return to the village, but the holidays came and went. He never left an address for Arthur, of course, and there was no number to call. Arthur couldn’t even hunt him down and yell at him for being an absent bastard. Meanwhile, he had to navigate Mrs. Morrison, alone, when she was armed with a sprig of mistletoe. 

He saw Eames’ mom once. Just once the whole year that his dad was stationed. She didn’t know who he was but Arthur recognized the sharp intelligence in her eyes. The intelligence that looked like mischief unless you knew what it was. He didn’t say anything to her. 

He wasted a week of his life wondering if he should have. 

Arthur never really made friends with anyone else in the village, though he was cordial enough to the other kids found around the base when the school year started again. He didn’t get close. There didn’t seem any point to it. No-one minded. 

At the end of the year, Arthur packed up his folder of photographs by hiding them in his underwear pile. He hadn’t looked at any of them, not once, not since the day they were developed, but he always knew they were there. He wasn’t going to leave them behind. 

When they drove out of the village and towards the motorway, the first leg of their journey to the commercial airport that would take them far away from this stupid, boring little village, Arthur realized that he had been right all along. 

The important thing to remember about Eames was that he was a liar.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Ten Year Anniversary.


End file.
